Enhancing the learning experience of students by incorporating core competences into assessment and inspiring diverse student cohorts to be authentic and context sensitive learners

I believe that empowerment of postgraduate students, through teamwork-based assessment items, greatly enhances their core skills which are required and essential in the workplace. This is more critical and indispensable as world of works is being more virtual and distant. Being an academic linked to industry through consultancy in business strategy, and having worked in three countries: New Zealand, Australia and Sri Lanka, over the last 18 years, I have a passion for improving learning and teaching within wider socio-cultural contexts, and incorporating a variety of teaching and assessment strategies into my practice. I have found that almost all postgraduate strategy courses at universities are focused more on individual assessment and very few have real-world business analysis as a basis for assessment. This led to development of teamwork-based assessment for my diverse cohort of students, using a team charter, case study analysis with presentations, and group critical essays on research papers with individual assessment component embedded to it. With a good sense of how competitive businesses operate, I creatively develop my assessment methods to prepare students to be industry ready employees for the complex world of business. In this process, I play a vital role in my students’ core skills development, through integrated and holistic assessment strategies and methods to enable active engagement, motivation for interactive learning, development of critical thinking and support for their chosen career direction. Assessment of multiple modes of learning is extremely challenging and requires an innovative approach. This study has supported and triangulated with students and fellow lecturers feedback, course results, and online course surveys feedback, conducted by the university.